2011/06/01

Claude Cahun & me/moi/jag

French writer, photographer and artist Claude Cahun (1894 - 1954) is quite new to me. I have most certainly seen some of her photos before, but I didn't know until recently that she was one of the first to experiment with her persona in self portraits. Her current exhibition at the Jeu de Paume in Paris is the perfect opportunity to get to know her work better. When seeing it, I immediately felt connected to her sense of surrealism, the way she disguises herself and the play with photomontage. Some of her images also reminds me of pictures that has influenced me through the years. A personal look back:

So trendy? Claude Cahun (by her real name Lucy Schwob) as a fashion icon, might not be the first thing that comes to mind. But don't you think she is the inspiration to this fashion feature, in french magazine Femme, from 1985? At the time I remember finding the bald "model" quite weird, now I certainly miss the avant garde-ness of it all.

Indian influence? C.C. to the left (1927). To the right, a photo from a book about german dancers (1920), that I got in a used book store some fifteen years ago.
These two images makes me want to know more about the cultural exchange between Germany and France between the world wars. It seems like such a creative era, cruelly interrupted by the fascist movement. Claude and her partner, Suzanne Malherbe, was in the resistance during the second world war, at Jersey. They showed an astonishing amount of courage and was nearly killed because of their efforts to discourage the nazi enemy.

Art director fan of french surrealism? Ok, this is a little far fetched, none the less, the ressemblance in the composition is striking.To the left, a selfportrait by C.C. To the the right, the cover of a 70s thriller that a friend's mum read back then. At the time, the evil look of the doppelgänger with the big knife, came to me at night and kept me from going to sleep…

• I'm a Swedish photographer, living in Paris, where this year I am taking classes at the media school EMI-CFD in photojournalism. This blog is all about my passion for photography. Shows I love, my own projects and what's going on in various networks.